Whenever the Pittsburgh Penguins come to town, the focus has to be on Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. The fact that they play on different lines makes the task of shutting them down that much harder. That tends to open up the game for Pittsburgh's depth, and they're capable. It showed last night.
Beau Bennett and Steve Downie undid the Canadiens in the first period last night, and Brandon Sutter widened the gap to 3-0 early in the second before Crosby sealed Montreal's fate with a powerplay goal in the dying seconds of the frame.
Turnovers and defensive lapses by the Canadiens gave the Penguins premium opportunities, and they capitalized. Marc-Andre Fleury had his impact on the game as well, robbing Jiri Sekac on a couple of great chances in the first period. He was rock solid in the second and third, getting the best of Alex Galchenyuk and keeping the Canadiens powerplay off the board when the game was still close.
Carey Price faced four unstoppable shots, and a couple of others care of Crosby and Nick Spalling hit posts. There wasn't much he could do about the outcome of the game.
If there was one positive to take out of it for the Canadiens, it was that they didn't give up in the third period, down 4-0 in a pretty hopeless cause. They didn't break through, but they created a lot of chances and dominated play for the most part, ensuring bad habits don't undo all the good ones they've cultivated over the last two weeks of winning hockey.
And with the St. Louis Blues coming into town Thursday, coming off a 2-0 loss to the Bruins last night in Boston, the Habs will need good habits to prevail.
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1) Alright, slightly elevated ice-time for Sekac in this one, up at 14:48. But when you see him play they way he's playing, and the top unit of Pacioretty-Desharnais-Parenteau doesn't have it, why not think about promoting him for a few shifts?
What about putting him on the powerplay?
2) Five losses in regulation this season: 7-1 to Tampa, 3-0 to Edmonton, 6-2 to Calgary, 5-0 to Chicago, 4-0 to Pittsburgh.
As bad as that is, they didn't get outscored 15-4 by Buffalo and Nashville in consecutive games.
All kidding aside (was I kidding?), when they lose, they lose hard.
3) Galchenyuk's composure with the puck has jumped a couple of levels since last year. His composure in scoring areas has jumped a level too, but it can be a lot better.
This is not a knock on Galchenyuk, who's been downright impressive so far. With a shot like his, and the hand skills he possesses, the finish is going to come with more regularity.
Galchenyuk has 47 shots on net through 20 games. He misses the net (hitting the posts counts as missing) a little bit more than he'd probably like to. He's shooting at 10.6%, which is 1% lower than his other two seasons in the NHL.
Here's a sign that he's going to start burying the puck a lot more. He's currently averaging 2.35 shots on net/game. That's up from 1.69 in 2013-14, up from 1.64 in 2012-13. Granted, his ice-time has progressively lengthened since his first season.
All signs point to more shots on net, and more goals.
Fyi, Galchenyuk played 18:29 last night. Second most-ice time he's had in his career. He played 19:03 against Los Angeles last year.
In five games--between last season and this season--over 18:00 of ice-time, Galchenyuk has only scored one goal (didn't play any games over 18:00 in 2012-13).
4) They weren't all his fault, but Tom Gilbert was on the ice for all four goals against. Not much he could do on the giveaway by Beaulieu (It wasn't all Beaulieu there, though he didn't exactly make a cautious play trying to hit Weise in the middle of his own zone. If Weise is going to make that cut, he better have his stick on the ice). Not much he could do on the Downie goal, as he had his man tied up. Not much he could do on Crosby's powerplay goal as Emelin missed his assignment--but assignments do get missed when you're down a man. Not much he could do on Sutter's goal, with Gallagher staring at the puck instead of picking up his man in the high slot.
But, it never feels good when you're on the ice for four goals against.
5) Mike Weaver missed the game with an upper body injury. No word on whether or not he'll be back on Thursday, but his absence put Drayson Bowman in the game, and Bowman was susceptible on Bennett's goal.